


i look into your eyes (and a stranger stares back)

by queenrinacat



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, So yeah, but i feel like the dean would use laf's love for perry against them, i dont know why, if it helps, im so sorry, this really hurts me too, this was kinda inspired by that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-06
Updated: 2015-10-06
Packaged: 2018-04-25 02:06:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4942558
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenrinacat/pseuds/queenrinacat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They have the Blade of Hastur, and the final battle of a long, long war is approaching rapidly.<br/>They don't have a choice.<br/>They have to kill the Dean.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i look into your eyes (and a stranger stares back)

**Author's Note:**

> THIS IS KBEARLUNA READ AND APPROVED (sorry im just freaking out because kaitlyn alexander said they loved this okay okay shhhhhhhhh let me have this)

“It has to be me,” LaFontaine said, in a tone that brooked no argument.

Laura opened her mouth, but to her surprise it was Carmilla that stepped in.

“LaFontaine, it’ll kill you,” she said, taking hold of Lafontaine’s upper arm and forcing them to look at her. “The Blade of Hastur consumes its wielder. The second you or anyone else uses it, they’re gone.”

“I know,” LaF said. Their face was stony, but their eyes were beginning to shine, cracks starting to appear in their façade like paint beginning to flake off.

“She’s my best friend,” they said, voice breaking. “It has to be me.”

Carmilla looked long and hard into their face. She read the desperation there, the resigned sorrow, LaFontaine’s eyes silently begging her to  _please try to understand_.

Reluctantly, she nodded.

“Carm—!” Laura protested.

“Laura, can I speak to you for a moment,” Carmilla said, her eyes never leaving LaFontaine’s.

Frantically looking between Carmilla and Lafontaine and Carmilla again, Laura allowed herself to be pulled aside.

“They can’t do it! It’ll kill them!”

“I know.”

“I—that—they—they cant survive that!”

“Yes.”

“Well—we can’t let them do that!” Laura gesticulated wildly, tugging at her own hair in frustration.

“It’s their prerogative,” Carmilla murmured. “It’s their love.” Carmilla smiled sadly, and brushed her knuckles down Laura’s cheek. “If I had to die, wouldn’t you want to be the one to do it?”

“That’s—that’s not—that’s not the same thing!”

“Isn’t it?”

Laura collapsed, sagging boneless into Carmilla’s arms.

“I can’t lose anyone else,” she begged. “Please Carm, won’t you try to convince them?”

Carmilla shook her head. “I’m sorry, Laura. I wont. I understand them too well.”

Laura started to cry, and as she gathered Laura up in her arms her eyes met theirs across the room. Slowly, Carmilla nodded.

———–------

The battlefield is covered in blood and hacked off body parts, human and not and LaFontaine doesn’t even know which is which anymore. Steel is ringing and people are screaming as they try to fight off the monsters the Dean summoned from beyond the Gates, demons and nightmares made flesh,  _things_ hideously morphed and twisted with haunting, awful grins. Their only chance is to find her, but so far she hasn’t appeared. They clutch the sword, hidden among the rocks and watching for her. Waiting.

“Looking for me?”

LaFontaine spun around, and saw Perry— _no, the Dean, she’s not Perry anymore this is the Dean_ —smirking at them. Her body was Perry’s but wrong somehow, all wrong, her eyes like flint and her posture sensual and relaxed, her voice husky and everything about her thrumming with power.

“Yeah,” they say, their voice full of a fierce confidence they don’t really feel, “I have been.” They draw the Blade of Hastur with trembling hands— _this isn’t Perry this is the Dean the Dean this isn’t Perry not Perry the Dean_ —and hold it at the ready.

Seeing the blade, the Dean began to laugh. “You really think you can kill me? Please, you couldn’t bear to, not in this body,” she said, gesturing down at Perry’s form.

LaFontaine’s eyes hardened. “Oh yeah?”

The Dean lifted an eyebrow, still casually unconcerned. “You know that sword will kill you? The second you use it, you’re done for.”

“Yeah, not really a problem for me.”

LaFontaine moved to swing the sword, but hesitated when they saw Perry’s face, arrested by the half-second of kindness they saw there.

The Dean smiled wider before she took on Perry’s mannerisms, hands fussing and body upright as her voice moved up to the pitch they loved so well. “LaFontaine! Sweetheart, you’re all grimy! Come, let’s get you washed up. I made snickerdoodles!”

LaFontaine reeled back like they’d been stabbed. It felt like they had.

“Oh goodness, what a mess. Did you set something on fire again?”

“Don’t,” they said quietly, squeezing their eyes shut.  _The Dean the Dean not Perry not—_

The Dean began to laugh silently, watching them crumple as they looked into the face they had been avoiding the sight of.

The Blade of Hastur slipped from LaF’s fingers and landed with a clatter on the stone floor. They backed up, shaking.  _Not Perry not Perry but what if she’s in there what if she can see Perry please_

“Please, stop it, please—!”

“You’re such a weirdo,” she said. Her voice held the memory of love, but it rang false. LaF covered their ears, curling into themself and beginning to sob.

“Of course I love you, weirdo. Remember when we were five, and I wanted to be mommy monster and you wanted to be a great adventurer?” The Dean cupped LaFontaine’s cheek, and they leaned into it instinctively before jerking away. “I couldn’t imagine being mommy monsters with anyone else.”

Silently, Carmilla slipped behind the Dean, delicately picking up the sword of Hastur. The Dean had grabbed LaFontaine’s face, forcing them to look into her eyes. LaFontaine looked entranced, tears beginning to dry on their cheeks as they gaped at Perry’s face smiling at them for the first time in months.

Carmilla quietly passed the blade to LaFontaine, who took a moment before they shook their head, seeming to surface from deep underwater.

LaFontaine steeled themself, taking a deep breath. “I love you too.”

The Dean smiled, triumphant.

“That’s why I have to do this.”

And with that, they swung.

When the Dean registered what they were doing, she howled with rage and clawed at LaFontaine, ripping open their chest and part of the arm they tried to shield it with. But it was too late, and the Blade of Hastur stabbed and wouldn’t let go. It quickly grew white-hot, and LaF let go, feeling the blade's fire begin to spread itself in burning tendrils underneath their skin, quickly climbing up their arm.

The Dean choked, blood dribbling down from her mouth as she grappled with the sword lodged in her abdomen, bloody fingers fumbling and slipping uselessly off the handle. Dark shadows began to coalesce around the blade where it was plunged to the hilt, and the Dean screamed, throwing her head back, shadows like flocks of crows fluttering and cawing flooding out of her mouth. Even as the shadows tried to flee, they began to burn in the air, shriveled with a golden fire and flaking away like so much ash as the Blade of Hastur pulsed with light.

A long moment later, Perry collapsed, unconscious, to the ground.

In the distance, the monsters the Dean had summoned from beyond the Gates were starting to falter without her power to sustain them, and Laura and Carmilla and the others were finally starting to push them back.

LaFontaine crawled over to her body, crying and repeating  _I’m so sorry_  and _I love you_  and  _please don’t die_ , even as they could feel the golden fire from the Blade of Hastur eating its way through their veins. LaFontaine cradled her to their chest, coughing up blood and fighting to stay conscious, pushing back the dark tide that promised to take away all the pain.

Perry’s eyes fluttered open, and LaF let out a sob of relief, carefully shifting so they were lying side by side, the stone cool and soothing where it pressed against their cheek. Perry whispered something, and LaF strained to hear.

She cleared her throat, and tried again. “Thank you,” she said earnestly.

“You’re dying,” LaF said, bemused.

“Yes, but…She’s gone. For real.” Perry coughed, and some more blood trickled from her mouth.

“Perr, I’m so sorry, I wish…”

“Shhh. You had to do it. There was no other way.” Perry smiled, her eyes shining with love and oh god how had they lived without the ridiculous control freak in their life for so long?

“It’s worth it, you know," she said. "Dying.”

“No, you’re…you’re gonna be okay, Carmilla will be here and we can save you and—”

“I don’t mind. Really. I’m glad.”

LaF shook their head, smiling through vision blurred with tears. “You would say that.” LaF tried to speak again but hacked, some blood filling their mouth before they spat it out.

Perry looked alarmed, reaching to cup their face with her hands. “LaF, sweetheart you’re bleeding you’re—” Perry saw the gaping wound on their chest and arm, and looked like she wanted to vomit. Her eyes widened with another realization, and she stared at them in horror.

“LaF, you used the Blade of Hastur.”

“Yeah.”

“LaFontaine, oh god, sweetheart you’re—”

“It’s okay, really, I’m fine,” LaF said, hurriedly hiding the wound with their free arm. “I mean, I’m dying, but I’m fine.”

And for once, they meant it.

They took a deep breath, trying to slow the burning they could feel pulsing from the sword, fighting to stay corporeal. _You don't leave Perry._ They let out the air in a whoosh and smiled, even as their heart was breaking. “It’s worth it, if it’s for someone you love.”

LaF traced the curve of her jaw with gentle fingers, wiping away the tears that spilled over from her eyes. They worked up the courage to look her full in the face, and they were caught, spellbound by the sparkle of sad eyes as familiar as their own, by the many years together that seemed to pass between them in that moment.

When you’ve been best friends for long enough, some things don’t need to be said.

“She wasn’t lying, you know,” Perry said. “I’ve loved you…” Perry coughed again, and some more red splattered across the stone floor. “Since we were five.”

LaF felt flames lick through their bones, and had to put all their energy into staying corporeal. They thought they must look like paper held over a candle, the way the page turns black before breaking and glowing white at the edges as the fire eats away at the paper.

“At least,” LaF took in a shallow breath, “At least we get to go together, right?”

“At least we get that.” She smiled, and kissed the tips of their fingers before lightly pressing her lips to theirs.

Right before the world goes black, LaFontaine feels Perry, sweet, wonderful, brave Perry, kiss them as gently as she knows how, and LaF kisses her back with chapped lips. It tastes like salt and memories and a lifetime of love they won’t get to live, and LaF remembers when they were five and a clumsy kiss from a curly redhead who pronounced them “all right” was the best gift they could have ever received.

——

_Susan heard a throat being cleared behind them, and felt a tap on their shoulder. They turned, to see a prim little girl with a red mane of curly hair, hands folded in front of her, smile at them._

_“I’m Lola. What’s your name?”_

_“I’m Susan.”_

_The curly-haired stranger nodded thoughtfully, her brow furrowed. Her eyes cleared, and she smiled widely. Susan thought it was the prettiest smile they had ever seen. “I like it.”_

_Susan smiled back, awkwardly. They hadn’t found many people worth smiling at, but for some reason, this girl—Lola, they reminded themself, Lola—was important. They were very sure of that, though they weren’t quite certain why._

_“Now,” Lola said bossily, “I need someone to play house with, so we’re going to be mommies together, and we have a boy and a girl and we live in a pink house.”_

_“Why pink?”_

_“It’s my favorite color.” Lola looked at them with a “duh” face._

_“Mine’s yellow.”_

_Lola smiled again, and Susan was distracted by how pretty she looked when she smiled._

_“It can be yellow and pink, then.”_

_Susan felt their heart swell to bursting, and couldn’t help a smile of their own—the widest that had ever stretched their face._

_“Okay.”_

_——---_

_At day’s end, Susan’s cheeks hurt from smiling and her stomach from laughing. They couldn’t remember ever having had this much fun before. The sun was starting to set, the playground cast in a warm red glow, and still the two were absorbed in their game. With some begging, Susan had gotten Lola to play monsters with them, even though Lola insisted that they were still mommies, so if they were monsters they were monster mommies. Susan thought that was the most brilliant idea they had ever heard._

_“Susan!” A voice broke in, and Susan was angry that their perfect bubble was being popped._

_“Susan, it’s time to go. Say goodbye to your new friend, and come along.”_

_Susan sighed morosely, and turned to Lola. “I have to go.”_

_Lola frowned, and slumped her shoulders. “Me too, I think.”_

_Lola was sad. They couldn’t have that. Susan grinned slyly, and poked Lola in the ribs until she stopped frowning and starting giggling helplessly._

_“Will you be here tomorrow?” She asked._

_“I promise,” they said._

_“You better pinkie promise.”_

_With all the solemnity of a grave ritual, Lola linked their pinkies and shook them before nodding in satisfaction._

_Susan turned to go, before stopping and turning back._

_“Lola?” They hesitated, kicking at the grass. Lola waited patiently, head tilted in question._

_“Willyoubemybestfriend?” Susan blurted out in a rush._

_Lola smiled, and bounced on her feet. “Of course, silly! Now you’re mine, too.”_

_“You’re really cool,” Susan admitted, looking at the ground and twisting their hands together._

_Lola scrunched up her nose, and cocked her head, studying them. Susan squirmed under the attention._

_“You’re all right,” she said, and leaned forward to give them a clumsy kiss on the lips. Susan felt fire rush to their face, and stared dopily after Lola as she scampered off to her mom._

_“Susan!”_

_“I’m coming!”_

_Lola was already holding her mom’s hand, but she turned back to wave at them. They waved back, heart beating fast._

_They didn’t think they’d ever been so happy._


End file.
